Paul Ha is the Director of White Columns, New York's oldest alternative art space. Besides showing the work of emerging artists, White Columns also maintains a slide registry of over 2,000 artists that is used as a resource by curators, writers and galleries.
PaintingsDIRECT (PD): How long have you been Director of White Columns, and what were you doing before you came here?
Paul Ha (PH): I've been Director of White Columns for two and a half years, and before that I was the Associate Director for about four years. Before that I was working in commercial galleries, mostly selling art but doing some curating too.
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PD: And you curate some of the shows at White Columns?
PH: A lot of them, actually.
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PD: Are the works in the shows taken from White Columns' slide files?
PH: Yes and no. The shows sort of come out of studio visits. I feel like my job is basically to show the artists that are in New York somehow. And by doing studio visits, shows sort of pop up. You see a lot of parallel development [in artists' studios] and I start noticing relationships between artists, and the shows sort of curate themselves. So I do a lot of studio visits and after seeing a few artists that are doing similar things, an idea gets planted.
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PD: What do you see as the goal or the program of White Columns?
PH: Basically what we're doing. Looking at all the slides that are submitted, and trying to give exposure to artists who are emerging and under-recognized.
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PD: That sounds like such a Herculean task. Are you overwhelmed by it?
PH: It sort of is overwhelming, but it's just something that we do, and you don't think twice about something that you do all the time. I think it's perfectly normal that we go through 10,000 packs of slides every year and I did 800 studio visits and stuff like that. It's true that others who don't do what we do probably think it's sort of insane, but it's just what we do.
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PD: What is one of your favorite shows you've put together during your time at White Columns?
PH: One of my favorite shows was called "Killing Time" in 1997. The show was
based on the idea of artists doing private performances for themselves
without having the intention of exhibiting the work. So the show was really
hard to put together. Visually it consisted of documentation and remnants
from the artists' performances: photographs, video, sets, and props. It
included works by Katrin Asbury, Dexter Buell, Charles Goldman, Lucy Gunning,
Ellie Murphy and Craig Smith. The show was successful visually and also it
proved to the audience that artists will create work even if no one is
looking.
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PD: In the hundreds of studio visits you've done, you must have seen some
crazy stuff. What's one of the funniest or weirdest studio visits you've ever done?
PH: I once visited an artist in Long Island City where the landlord had
locked him out that day because he hadn't paid rent for a while. I wasn't
aware of it at first. The artist told me that he had lost his key and it
would only take him a minute to cut the lock. After 30 minutes of working (it
was a good lock), he called a friend and they took apart the whole storefront
so that we could squeeze through. The power was cut off so we had to use
flashlights to see the work. After a while it occurred to me that something
was up, and from then on during the whole visit I was wondering if we were
going to get a visit from the police.
On another visit, the artist's studio was basically a crawl space in a
building and the ceiling was so low that he actually had two chairs on wheels
and we did the whole visit while rolling around in the chairs. If you were to
stand up, you would hit your head on the ceiling. Artists make work where
they can.
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PD: Did you ever make art yourself?
PH: I have a degree in painting, but in my last year of school I told all my professors I was never going to paint again and I kept my word. I realized I had absolutely no talent and I realized that my time could be used better in other ways. I could put shows together and still be around art because I love art and artists and I want to help them. I realized there was more need for someone to help artists than to be another artist.
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PD: What do you think is the Internet's place in the art world and in the art marketplace?
PH: I think the Internet is incredible, especially in communications and also to just be able to see what's going on. Now you can just log on and find out who was at what opening and what show's up where and what show Giuliani's closing down. Communication-wise I think it's amazing. I think email is phenomenal.
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PD: Do you think New York is the capital of the Art World?
PH: Yes.
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PD: Indisputably?
PH: Yes.
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PD: Do you see any threats from any sides?
PH: Nope.
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